Problem: Mythic screws up a stealth nerf of the archers, thus bolluxing their crit shot. No adjustments were supposed to be made to the skill, and the problem didn't occur on the test server.

Reaction: People on the boards are pissed that you screwed up and FUBAR'd their class. Again.

Mythic solution: Insult the paying customers by acting as though they're idiots for your mistake.

Reaction: People get good and pissed. More than one user lets you know they have cancelled their accounts over your unacceptable customer service.

Mythic solution: Offer an apology in which you again treat users like idiots for your mistake.

Reaction: For some strange reason, people don't accept the apology. More people are pissed off, the situation is snowballing.

Mythic Solution: AGAIN insult the paying customers who are angry because you screwed up. Demand the topic be locked by mods to cover up what you did. Nail yourselves to the cross because people criticizing you for bad business practices are "calling us the antichrist."

Yes viking, Sanya is. That was rather the point of the post, wasn't it?

"You're being mean to us and calling us antichrists and syaing we're evil and bla bla bla just by cancelling your accounts and saying we're engaged in unprofessional and unethical business practices."

Sounds like a whine to me fanbois. And let's not neglect the part where she actually had the gall to call on the mods to shut down a thread THAT MYTHIC STARTED because she didn't like the reaction.

I have a job. I work for the money with which I pay for this game. That's why I complain when that money is stolen, and why I won't be giving them any more. Go ahead and insult me, lie about me, and generally act as though I have no right to the product as advertised when I payed them. You just make the game die faster. Which is fine by me, I loved watching it happen to AO.

i am 34, married and have a child on the way. i work full time. i have a master's degree and 2 bachelors degrees. i play a ranger and was directly affected by the bug and when i read mark's post i didn't take it they way some of you "adults" are taking it. i think you missed the humor in his words. sure, maybe he shouldn't have joked about something that affected so many archers in a really cripling way, but given that and given the wild accusations of the player base on this board about the bug prior to him posting, his sarchasm was fitting and clear.

"So, I'm tempted to think that some people here really either (a) don't know me well enough; (b) need to relax just a little bit; (c) just looking for an excuse to flame; (d) truly misunderstood my tone. "

Exactly Mark!

Not many on these boards know you at all. The first thing I learned many years ago in freshman english class was that you need to be sensitive to your audience. If you're writing to your friends, be as sarcastic as you want. When you're trying to be sarcastic to 30k customers who have no way of knowing what your tone is because they don't have enough context to do so, you probably should use a little caution to avoid misunderstandings.

Another little tip to avoid pissing more people off: don't tell people that they need to relax - it just pisses them off

Nope Viking. I live in the one where I actually deal with problems instead of burying my head in the sand and making believe they don't exist.
You live in the one where not only do you bury your head in the sand, you insult everyone (using homophobic epithets no less, there's "maturity" for ya) who doesn't do the same.

My post was directed at Sanya. It had nothing to do with you in any way. But you had to troll in just to hear your own voice.

And here, for the record, is the relevant section of Sanya's whine on the topic (Heh, page back, and already none of the trolls have read it. Guess fanbois are the ones who don't read the thread, eh Sanya?):

"Mark is either the antichrist or TEH COOLEST. I am either an incompetent liar or the bluebird of happiness. The game is either a completely broken piece of garbage or an essentially good game with lots of potential and a dev team frantically addressing issues. The sides have been chosen for the battle between good and evil. Did I miss anything? No? Oh, good. Someone can lock the thread then."

No Sanya. You're just a bad employee of a bad company doing a bad job. Like the CR folks at Funcom, Verant, Cornered Rat, and many others. That means your customers are not going to like you. They are not going to cheer for you every time you show up. They are going to complain about the problems you caused, which they have to fund. And the worse you do, the more they'll quit, and the faster you'll stop getting that chekc you like to cash every two weeks. Get used to it. You couple free speech and capitalism and this is what you get.

Ya, chill out. Calm down. Cool off, be relaxed, don't complain, and proceed to bend way over as Mythic services its customers. Just like everyone said would save AO, when they effectively shut down the boards. That game is still #1 on the sales lists, right?

Laigle.... what don't you understand about you are not the majority?? The majority like the game, like marks post, and like sanyas post, so why change for the Minority?? And that 98% of the people here would probably MUCH rather be personal friends with Sanya than You just from reading posts.... cause you are a whining bitch?? Poeple don't like to hang around whining bitches. I spot read your previous posts, and that's what you are. You are a negative person. That causes people around you to be negative also... and positive people really don't like that.

If Mythic goes out of business, then it is our loss, since we really like most everything about it, including their attitude. And we are the Majority!! And if they don't go out of business.... then we just get to have the boards without flames, only constructive criticism.... and no whiners like you...

And about "When you're trying to be sarcastic to 30k customers who have no way of knowing what your tone is because they don't have enough context to do so, you probably should use a little caution to avoid misunderstandings."
This is pretty much true, but it is because the general population is stupid. I don't know Mark, and have NEVER read one of his posts before... and I understood and grinned.

Um, why in the hell would I care what the majority thinks? Give me just one reason I would want to be in the majority. One.

I want to be RIGHT. That entails nothing about how many people agree with me. And in fact, the more whiney illiterate 12 year olds who make laughably erroneous "arguments" in support of why I'm not ub3r, the more I'll be confidant of where I stand.

And if you think flaming me is a good tactic to shut me up, all I have to say is hardy har har. I have never been flamed off a board by a whiney 12 year old, and I never will.

You keep your weak-kneed majority. Go stand silently together in a show of desperately wanting to agree with everyone else, regardless of what they say. Have fun with it.

I, on the other hand, will be here, happily expressing my beef with the people who have stolen my money. And I will giggle merrily at your shortcomings as I do so.

And eventually, your majority will melt away as they sense the wind blowing this way or that. The majority of people got 60 FPS in Ultima 9. The majority of people never experienced a bug or lag in AO. Awfully lucky for the majority eh? And of course for those companies, since they're still turning such HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE profits.

The only points I was attempting to make were that this thread has had no new viewpoints in pages, that no one was even reading the entire monstrosity before posting their two cents, and that the level of politeness has dropped right through the floor. I am sorry if you missed that point; I must have been unclear.

hmmm since everyone else is adding there 2 cents.
Mark posted a sarcastic response to a serious issue. Regardless of what anyone else had posted/flamed in my opinion he should have made his first post a simple acknoledgement that there was a problem and it was being worked on.

By doing that the archers would have had a single thread to put posts in enstead of 200 different posts, it would have also set the mood of the post. Enstead it sprung up 100 different mark is rude posts, cluttered the issue and aggrivated the issue even more.

There is nothing wrong with him replying to rude posts the way he does, but to start a new one, IMO, sets a bad mood for the entire thread.

Sanya's request to lock the thread is motivated purely from a Spin Doctor's perspective. She is public relations. If this thread were favorable she would not make this request.It appears the majority of the posts are not advancing Mythic's official position, as outlined by the bereft humor of Mark Jacobs.

Its not an "either/or" issue as she would have you believe. It is more complex than that. There are good points and there are bad points. Imo, the scales are tipped in favor of Mythic's responsibility to complete the product, they materially misrepresented. That much is plain and simple.

Sanya, I want you to listen carefully. This is important. It should be framed and put on your wall, because it is the guiding principle of your job:

"If you want to stop complaints, fix the problem."

Yeah, I guess it does lack a certain novelty. I suppose I should be more original instead of truthful or honest. But I can't help that, just the way I am.

If you fix the bugs, you will either shut up the complaints, or take away the cudgel that those evil customers are trying to use to ruin your good perfect game. If you leave the bugs in, insult your customers, make more bugs, and drive your game into the ground, then your game will, well, be driven into the ground.
Odd concept I know. I think people back in olden times called it cause and effect. Too bad it didn't get shipped off to the netherworld with phlogiston.

Sanya, you are community relations staff. It is your job to notify Mythic of the community's concerns, and to let the community know about Mythic's solution.
It is not your job, nor is it a sign that you are doing it competently, to take time away from that to insult people because Mythic screwed up.
It is not your job to call the TLs liars for forwarding information they were erroneously given by Mythic to us.
And it is not our job to find and/or fix your bugs, unless we want to, in which case we are free to play the test server. The cost of the game that we already paid you was for a tested, finished product. Tweaking is one thing, releasing an unfinished PoS is another. We have no obligation to sit back and relax as you take more of our money while buggering the game further.
Your game is live now. No more beta test. That's over. Fix the bugs, in a timely manner, or you are stealing our money. Provide competent, timely CSRs, or you are stealing our money. Provide the content you promised us at release to get us to pay you this long, or you are stealing our money.
This is commerce. We are your customers. We are not your friends. We have no obligation to stand by you no matter what. We have no obligation to put up with your temper tantrums.
*We paid you*. You can either give us what we paid for, give the money back, or be truthfully called cheats and liars in every forum in the Republic. With stunning frequency and irate tone. And rightfully so.

And that is my last word on this particular subject, in this particular thread. I've said it so many times, in so many places, and will continue to do so, that making this particular thread an issue further is pointless. If others want to keep the thread, and Mythic's incompetence, on the front page with arguments or insults, feel free.
That is after all why I encourage flame wars in threads like these, because without the help of laughably malleable fanbois, it's too hard to keep them bumped (speaking of which, your mothers all wear army boots <sits back and watches 200 posts build up, laughing uncontrollably>). And potential customers deserve to see the nincompoops that are selling this product.
But unless I see something I think needs my specific response (and don't hink for a second that I don't think properly put insults and flames don't), I'm off to point out your shortcomings in the oh-so-many other threads they are being discussed. See you there!

as Sanya said I read Mark's post, then a few more, scrolled till I saw that guy with the huge star for posting 10000 or so times, then scrolled till i saw any red fonted posters =P

people need to chill out, but I would like to see a list of your priorities, when you expect them to be done (and make sure to say that it's likely they won't be done by then) and a list of smaller/easier changes that will be made while working on those larger issues to give the workers (programers?) a change of pace.